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Early detection of prostate cancer is critical for the success of cancer therapy. It is believed that the biochemical changes that cause the optical spectra changes would appear earlier than the histological aberration. The aim of this ex vivo study was to evaluate the ability of Stokes Shift Spectra (S3) to identify human prostate cancerous tissues from the normal. Fifteen (15) pairs of with pathologically confirmed human prostate cancerous and normal tissues underwent Stokes Shift Spectra measurements with selective wavelength interval of 40 nm. The spectra were then analyzed using machine learning (ML) algorithms to classify the two types of tissues. The ML algorithms including principal component analysis (PCA) and nonnegative matrix factorization (NMF) were used for dimension reduction and feature detection. The characteristic component spectra were used to identify the key fluorophores related to carcinogenesis. The results show that these key fluorophores within tissue, e.g., tryptophan, collagen, and NADH, have different relative concentrations between cancerous and normal tissues. A multi-class classification was performed using support vector machines (SVMs). A leave-one-out cross validation was used to evaluate the performance of the classification with the gold standard histopathological results as the ground truth. The results with high sensitivity and specificity indicate that the S3 method is effective for detecting changes of fluorophore composition in human prostate tissues due to the development of cancer. © 2021 SPIE.

Recent reports pointed out that the application of optical spectroscopy in the field of liquid biopsy has aroused great interest among researchers and demonstrated the potential of its clinical application. We report a preliminary investigation on the visible resonance Raman (VRR) spectra of human brain blood liquid collected from the scalp and around the meningeal tumor during surgery and a set of venous blood samples from healthy people and glioma grade III patients using a portable VRR-LRRTM, HR800, HR-Evolution and WITec300 Raman systems in vivo and ex vivo. The biochemical fingerprints and molecular biomarkers were found. These findings indicate that if VRR spectroscopy technology is combined with polymerase chain reaction (PCR) or genetic molecular biomarker methods (VRR-PCR), it will greatly increase the possibility for its clinical application. © 2021 SPIE.

Metastasis is the leading cause of mortalities in cancer patients due to the spreading of cancer cells to various organs. Detecting cancer and identifying its metastatic potential at the early stage is important. This may be achieved based on the quantification of the key biomolecular components within tissues and cells using recent optical spectroscopic techniques. The aim of this study was to develop a noninvasive label-free optical biopsy technique to retrieve the characteristic molecular information for detecting different metastatic potentials of prostate cancer cells. Herein we report using native fluorescence (NFL) spectroscopy along with machine learning (ML) to differentiate prostate cancer cells with different metastatic abilities. The ML algorithms including principal component analysis (PCA) and nonnegative matrix factorization (NMF) were used for dimension reduction and feature detection. The characteristic component spectra were used to identify the key biomolecules that are correlated with metastatic potentials. The relative concentrations of the molecular spectral components were retrieved and used to classify the cancer cells with different metastatic potentials. A multi-class classification was performed using support vector machines (SVMs). The NFL spectral data were collected from three prostate cancer cell lines with different levels of metastatic potentials. The key biomolecules in the prostate cancer cells were identified to be tryptophan, reduced nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NADH) and hypothetically lactate as well. The cancer cells with different metastatic potentials were classified with high accuracy using the relative concentrations of the key molecular components. The results suggest that the changes in the relative concentrations of these key fluorophores retrieved from NFL spectra may present potential criteria for detecting prostate cancer cells of different metastatic abilities.

We conducted speckle imaging observations of 53 stellar systems that were members of long-term radial velocity (RV) monitoring campaigns and exhibited substantial accelerations indicative of planetary or stellar companions in wide orbits. Our observations were made with blue and red filters using the Differential Speckle Survey Instrument at Gemini-South and the NN-Explore Exoplanet Stellar Speckle Imager at the WIYN telescope. The speckle imaging identifies eight luminous companions within 2" of the primary stars. In three of these systems-HD 1388, HD 87359, and HD 104304-the properties of the imaged companion are consistent with the RV measurements, suggesting that these companions may be associated with the primary and the cause of the RV variation. For all 53 stellar systems, we derive differential magnitude limits (i.e., contrast curves) from the imaging. We extend this analysis to include upper limits on companion mass in systems without imaging detections. In 25 systems, we rule out companions with masses greater than 0.2 M⊙, suggesting that the observed RV signals are caused by late-M dwarfs or substellar (potentially planetary) objects. On the other hand, the joint RV and imaging analysis almost entirely rules out planetary explanations of the RV signal for HD 19522 and suggests that the companion must have an angular separation below a few tenths of an arcsecond. This work highlights the importance of combined RV and imaging observations for characterizing the outer regions of nearby planetary systems. © 2021 Institute of Physics Publishing. All rights reserved.

We present high-resolution speckle interferometric imaging observations of TESS exoplanet host stars using the NN-EXPLORE Exoplanet and Stellar Speckle Imager instrument at the 3.5 m WIYN telescope. Eight TESS objects of interest that were originally discovered by Kepler were previously observed using the Differential Speckle Survey Instrument. Speckle observations of 186 TESS stars were carried out, and 45 (24%) likely bound companions were detected. This is approximately the number of companions we would expect to observe given the established 46% binarity rate in exoplanet host stars. For the detected binaries, the distribution of stellar mass ratio is consistent with that of the standard Raghavan distribution and may show a decrease in high-q systems as the binary separation increases. The distribution of binary orbital periods, however, is not consistent with the standard Ragahavan model, and our observations support the premise that exoplanet-hosting stars with binary companions have, in general, wider orbital separations than field binaries. We find that exoplanet-hosting binary star systems show a distribution peaking near 100 au, higher than the 40–50 au peak that is observed for field binaries. This fact led to earlier suggestions that planet formation is suppressed in close binaries.

To achieve healthy communities, addressing food insecurity (FI) is critical. This study describes a unique food distribution program combining a mobile Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) for children with a mobile pantry for adults. A survey (n = 153) of participants at six locations in New Haven Connecticut revealed that 36% reported FI and 76% were first-time pantry users. Three- quarters participated in SNAP, WIC, or both, and two-thirds had children who were fed by SFSP. Major federal programs do not eliminate FI, therefore local voluntary organizations are essential partners to address the food crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The disproportionate impact of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) on African American communities necessitates an increased focus on the intersectional roles of racism, stigma, and other social determinants of health in influencing disease and mortality risk. The Weathering Framework is applied to demonstrate the dynamic interrelationships between these factors and to conceptualize COVID-19 as a stressful life event that will have profound health implications over the life course for African Americans. Recommendations for population health research, interventions and policies aimed at reducing COVID-19 incidence and mortality, and mitigation of the long-term impacts of the pandemic on communities of color are discussed.

Diabetes is one of the leading fatal diseases globally, putting a huge burden on the global healthcare system. Early diagnosis of diabetes is hence, of utmost importance and could save many lives. However, current techniques to determine whether a person has diabetes or has the risk of developing diabetes are primarily reliant upon clinical biomarkers. In this article, we propose a novel deep learning architecture to predict if a person has diabetes or not from a photograph of his/her retina. Using a relatively small-sized dataset, we develop a multi-stage convolutional neural network (CNN)-based model DiaNet that can reach an accuracy level of over 84% on this task, and in doing so, successfully identifies the regions on the retina images that contribute to its decision-making process, as corroborated by the medical experts in the field. This is the first study that highlights the distinguishing capability of the retinal images for diabetes patients in the Qatari population to the best of our knowledge. Comparing the performance of DiaNet against the existing clinical data-based machine learning models, we conclude that the retinal images contain sufficient information to distinguish the Qatari diabetes cohort from the control group. In addition, our study reveals that retinal images may contain prognosis markers for diabetes and other comorbidities like hypertension and ischemic heart disease. The results led us to believe that the inclusion of retinal images into the clinical setup for the diagnosis of diabetes is warranted in the near future.

An explorative survey pertaining to organization and execution of programs and events offered in public libraries across Connecticut revealed that library programs have been steadily increasing in recent years, with most libraries providing one hundred or more programs a year. The types of programs that are most popular vary throughout the library’s open hours. Children’s programming appears to be more popular during the day while adult programming is more popular in the evening. Program popularity is based on grouping and continuous support from external partners. While this study confirmed that both library space and library staff sizes are adequate for programming, a further investigation would assert that this is the case within nationwide library programming.

Hinges creak, and she swirls in the door, puts her finger to blue lips. Cold takes the old woodcutter, eyes open, breath frozen in his beard.  But crystals melt in your lashes as you gaze on her gl…

"Photovoice for Social Justice, the latest volume in Sage's Qualitative Research Methods Series, helps readers in the health and social sciences learn the foundations and applications of this exciting qualitative method. Authors Jean M. Breny and Shannon L. McMorrow approach photovoice as not only a community-based participatory research method, but as a method for social justice, centering community participants, organizations, and policy makers at the heart of this research method. Special topics relating to social justice include a focus on ethics and working with marginalized communities, sensitive concerns during data collection, and presenting the work to communities and policymakers, as well as academics. Written for students and researchers new to photovoice, this brief text takes readers from the process of conceptualizing and implementing a photovoice study to analyzing data and finally presenting the results of the study. The book concludes with suggestions for future iterations of photovoice, including web based resources and digital storytelling. The authors take into account the realities of photovoice as a method by providing practical, applied tools including sample consent forms, presentations, recruitment flyers, and photo-taking tips. Using Photovoice for Social Justice, new and experienced researchers can design, implement, and analyze their photovoice projects" --

Objectives: Cranial vault modification (CVM), the intentional reshaping of the head, indicated group affiliation in prehistoric Andean South America. This study aims to analyze CVM data from the Cuzco region of Peru to illuminate patterns of early migration and settlement along with the later impact of the Inca Empire (AD 1438–1532) on the ethnic landscape. Materials and Methods: 419 individuals from 10 archaeological sites spanning over 2300 years were assessed for CVM using morphological analysis. Results: CVM patterns show distinct temporal attributes: the tabular type of modification appeared first and dominated the early sample (900 BC–AD 600), followed by an influx of unmodified crania during the Middle Horizon (AD 600–1000). The annular type appeared later during the Late Intermediate Period (AD 1000–1438). In the subsequent period of Inca imperialism, modification rates were higher at sites in the Cuzco countryside than in Cuzco city sites. Discussion: The study results, combined with archaeological and ethnohistoric data, reveal the sociopolitical transformations that occurred prior to and during the rise of the Inca Empire. The influx of unmodified crania during the Middle Horizon resulted at least partly from Wari occupation, while the appearance of the annular type during the LIP points to migration into the area, possibly from the Lake Titicaca region. In the Inca Imperial Period, Inca individuals at Cuzco city sites refrained from modification as a sign of their ethnic identity, while modification patterns in the Cuzco countryside likely reflect state-coerced resettlement of different ethnic groups. © 2020 Wiley Periodicals LLC.

Using data on a sample of small Iowa towns consistently collected over two decades, we investigate how agglomeration economies, social capital, human capital, local fiscal policy, and natural amenities affect new firm entry. We find that human capital and agglomeration are more conducive to new firm entry than are natural amenities, local fiscal policy, or social capital. The impact of local fiscal policy is too small to overcome the locational disadvantages from insufficient endowment of human capital and agglomeration. A rural development approach that encourages firm entry in rural towns with the largest endowments of human capital and market agglomeration would be more successful than trying to raise firm entry in every town.

Background: Incivility and bullying within the profession of nursing remains a problem within the workplace. As a result, healthcare workplaces can become unhealthy and difficult for nurses to function within. Work productivity is impacted and patients' healthcare is placed at risk when nurses are emotionally and physically affected by workplace incivility and bullying. Clinical nurse leaders (CNLs) applying theoretical reasoning and nursing competencies' in addressing bullying and incivility within the workplace, can provide an organized and effective organizational approach to addressing bullying and incivility in work environments. Methods: Theoretical reasoning and nursing competencies in addressing bullying and incivility within the workplace, will be examined as a means to identify nurses exhibiting signs and symptoms of bullying and incivility in work environments. The theory of The Hollow will identify the origins of affected nurses' behaviors and the physiological and psychological impact of bullying and incivility. The CNL role will be used as a facilitator of change at the microsystem level. And competencies for addressing behaviors associated with bullying and incivility will be addressed. Approach: Innovation adapted from prior research and literature developed by the author, extrapolated from the literature on workplace bullying and incivility in nursing practice. Outcomes: Bullying and incivility can be resolved in the workplace when competencies are set forth by nursing leaders to educate and empower nursing staff on expectations of healthy work environments. Conclusion: Healthy workplaces are achievable when nurse leaders, such as CNLs, educate and empower nurses to have the expectation of healthy work environments not only for themselves, but for all nurses. © 2020 Wiley Periodicals LLC

BACKGROUND: Opioid overdoses are primarily discussed by the pharmacological properties of the drugs used. Research shows that other factors such as the social/physical environment and the mental/emotional states can have an impact on overdose events. Ataiants and colleagues (2020) used Zinberg's "drug, set, and setting" framework to identify circumstances surrounding overdose experiences of street-involved women in Philadelphia. The aim of this paper is to extend their analysis to a diverse sample of suburban women who experienced overdoses., METHODS: The mixed-methods design consisted of ethnographic fieldwork, in-depth interviews, and brief surveys with 32 suburban women who use opioids. Inductive theoretical reasoning and constant comparative analysis facilitated themes emerging within the "drug, set, and setting" framework., RESULTS: Eighteen out of 32 women identified "drug" as the primary factor involved in their overdose events. Major themes were an inability to identify the synthetic opioid fentanyl, lack of knowledge or control over how much to use, poly-substance use, and an insufficient understanding of risks. Eleven out of 32 women linked "set" to their overdose experiences. Themes included emotional trauma, such as death of a child, child custody issues, and mental health conditions, such as depression. Six out of 32 women associated "setting" with one of their overdose experiences. Themes were related to being with friends or partners that used, and having recently been released from treatment or incarceration., CONCLUSION: Findings show similar themes found among an urban sample, adding insight on the need for effective overdose interventions targeted for suburban populations. The opioid crisis is not confined to the cities, and neither should services aimed at addressing opioid overdose. The knowledge provided here can help policy makers support female-centered harm reduction services not only in urban areas but also in the suburbs. Copyright © 2020. Published by Elsevier B.V.

The performance of any meta-heuristic algorithm depends highly on the setting of dependent parameters of the algorithm. Different parameter settings for an algorithm may lead to different outcomes. An optimal parameter setting should support the algorithm to achieve a convincing level of performance or optimality in solving a range of optimization problems. This paper presents a novel enhancement method for the salp swarm algorithm (SSA), referred to as enhanced SSA (ESSA). In this ESSA, the following enhancements are proposed: First, a new position updating process was proposed. Second, a new dominant parameter different from that used in SSA was presented in ESSA. Third, a novel lifetime convergence method for tuning the dominant parameter of ESSA using ESSA itself was presented to enhance the convergence performance of ESSA. These enhancements to SSA were proposed in ESSA to augment its exploration and exploitation capabilities to achieve optimal global solutions, in which the dominant parameter of ESSA is updated iteratively through the evolutionary process of ESSA so that the positions of the search agents of ESSA are updated accordingly. These improvements on SSA through ESSA support it to avoid premature convergence and efficiently find the global optimum solution for many real-world optimization problems. The efficiency of ESSA was verified by testing it on several basic benchmark test functions. A comparative performance analysis between ESSA and other meta-heuristic algorithms was performed. Statistical test methods have evidenced the significance of the results obtained by ESSA. The efficacy of ESSA in solving real-world problems and applications is also demonstrated with five well-known engineering design problems and two real industrial problems. The comparative results show that ESSA imparts better performance and convergence than SSA and other meta-heuristic algorithms.

The Paraná Basin, Brazil and the Chaco-Paraná Basin, Uruguay both contain sedimentary records that are critical to reconstructing late Paleozoic ice centers in central Gondwana. The orientations of subglacial landforms and glaciotectonic structures suggest that late Paleozoic glacial deposits in the eastern Chaco-Paraná Basin and the southernmost Paraná Basin are genetically related, as they were likely glaciated by the same ice center. However, the location and extent of the ice center responsible for depositing these sediments are unclear. Furthermore, changes in sediment dispersal patterns between glacial, inter-glacial, and post-glacial intervals are not understood for this region of Gondwana. Therefore, this study utilized U–Pb detrital zircon geochronology to assess the provenance of glacial and post-glacial sediments from the eastern Chaco-Paraná Basin (San Gregorio, Cerro Pelado, Tres Islas Formations) and the southernmost Paraná Basin (Itararé Group). Results show dominant age peaks at 520–555 Ma, 625 Ma, 750–780 Ma, and 900–1000 Ma in all samples from the eastern Chaco-Paraná Basin. These zircons are interpreted to have been derived from sources in the Cuchilla Dionisio Terrane and Punta del Este Terrane in southeastern Uruguay, and possibly the Namaqua Belt in southern Namibia. Another important source was likely Devonian sedimentary rocks of the Durazno Group in central/eastern Uruguay. Meanwhile, a sample of the glaciogenic Itararé Group from the southernmost Paraná Basin contains a different detrital zircon signature with peaks at 580 Ma, 780 Ma, 2110 Ma, and 2500 Ma that closely resembles underlying sedimentary and meta-sedimentary rocks of the Precambrian/Cambrian Camaquã Basin. Detrital zircon ages in the glacial and post-glacial sediments indicate that local sources were dominant. In contrast, zircon ages from relatively ice-distal glaciomarine intervals in the Chaco-Paraná Basin reflect more distal sources to the east and southeast, which indicates a larger drainage catchment opened when glaciers retreated and/or the zone of maximum subglacial erosion shifted. Although most zircon ages in the Chaco-Paraná Basin can be attributed to Uruguayan sources, results support the hypothesis that glaciers emanated from southern Namibia and southeast Uruguay into the Chaco-Paraná Basin. From there, ice flowed northwest into the Paraná Basin and then receded back towards Africa as the paleoclimate warmed. The detrital zircon inventory in our study region is distinct from the eastern Paraná Basin, suggesting at least two unique African source regions for glaciers that deposited sediments in the Paraná and Chaco-Paraná Basins. © 2020 Elsevier Ltd

Social workers have always worked with and within uncertainties in practice, but the COVID-19 pandemic is amplifying the frequency and degree of uncertainty across ecological levels. Social workers need enhanced capacity to work with these uncertainties and the impact on individual and collective wellbeing. The RE/UN/DIScover heuristic guides social workers’ responses to the wide range of practice uncertainties experienced in the moment and over time. Drawing on understandings of embodied wellbeing from interpersonal neurobiology and the power relations manifest in intersectional positionality, RE/UN/DIScover offers embodied, iterative practices to access the wealth of capabilities within self and others. IMPLICATIONS Disruptions and uncertainties connected with pandemics, economic recessions, continued systemic injustices and other human-made problems can challenge social workers and impact the wellbeing of individuals and communities. Heuristics are guides that sort, order, and inform decisions and actions. The RE/UN/DIScover heuristic uses knowledge about embodied wellbeing and various forms of power to guide social workers. RE/UN/DIScover offers social workers practices to use with uncertainties both in the moment and over time. © 2020 Australian Association of Social Workers.

Meta-heuristic search algorithms were successfully used to solve a variety of problems in engineering, science, business, and finance. Meta-heuristic algorithms share common features since they are population-based approaches that use a set of tuning parameters to evolve new solutions based on the natural behavior of creatures. In this paper, we present a novel nature-inspired search optimization algorithm called the capuchin search algorithm (CapSA) for solving constrained and global optimization problems. The key inspiration of CapSA is the dynamic behavior of capuchin monkeys.The basic optimization characteristics of this new algorithm are designed by modeling the social actions of capuchins during wandering and foraging over trees and riverbanks in forests while searching for food sources. Some of the common behaviors of capuchins during foraging that are implemented in this algorithm are leaping, swinging, and climbing. Jumping is an effective mechanism used by capuchins to jump from tree to tree. The other foraging mechanisms exercised by capuchins, known as swinging and climbing, allow the capuchins to move small distances over trees, tree branches, and the extremities of the tree branches. These locomotion mechanisms eventually lead to feasible solutions of global optimization problems. The proposed algorithm is benchmarked on 23 well-known benchmark functions, as well as solving several challenging and computationally costly engineering problems. A broad comparative study is conducted to demonstrate the efficacy of CapSA over several prominent meta-heuristic algorithms in terms of optimization precision and statistical test analysis. Overall results show that CapSA renders more precise solutions with a high convergence rate compared to competitive meta-heuristic methods. © 2020, Springer-Verlag London Ltd., part of Springer Nature.